Stopping The Bleeding

by digby

An emailer just asked an interesting question, to which I don’t have an adequate answer. He notes, correctly, that this crisis is one of incredible complexity which really requires some thoughtful analysis and discussion rather than a stampede to give Wall Street 700 billion that may not do the job in the month before an historic election. He asks if anyone knows what the congress could do in the short term to stop the bleeding, without giving away the store. It’s hard to believe that the only workable short term measure is to throw as much money at Wall Street as we’ve thrown at the Iraq war.

I can’t repeat often enough how nuts it is to follow the Bush administration over another cliff. It’s possible that this 700 billion is the only thing that stands between us and global financial catastrophe. But the credibility of the people involved is so damaged that we can’t afford to take their word for it.

The only responsible thing to do is to figure out a way to stanch the bleeding until the voters decide which candidate and party they prefer to lead them through this crisis. Ramming this through five weeks before an election, in the same way they rammed through the Iraq war resolution in 2002, with public fear mongering and threats to lawmakers that they will suffer at the ballot box if they don’t go along, is a recipe for disaster.

At this point it appears to me that McCain is doing the predictable thing. He is positioning himself against the plan and I believe he will find a way to vote against it come what may. He’s long needed to distance himself from Bush’s catastrophe and demagogue the Democrats in congress in order to establish himself as the real change agent. This is his opening. (And I don’t think it matters if Obama votes against the bill as well. He’ll be held responsible for the Democratic Party’s “tax and spend” liberal ways anyway.)

I don’t know if it will work. The American people may be too angry to believe him. But it’s a big opportunity for McCain and other endangered Republicans to finally put some daylight between themselves and Bush. The Democrats shouldn’t let them do it. They are Republicans who marched in lockstep with their fearless leader on everything until about five minutes ago and they should pay the price politically. That’s how the system is supposed to work.

This is a scary time. Bush is the lamest of ducks but he is still president for another four months and the damage he could do in that time is incalculable. It’s a big chance to take. But the absolute most irresponsible thing that Democrats could do is allow the election of another Republican administration — all else pales before the prospect of another four years of this kind of governance.

Everyone needs to keep in mind that in spite of everything, the biggest danger to the world economic system and the security of the planet in general is to elect John McCain and his successor, Sarah Palin to preside over the mess that that the conservatives have made of things. We might as well take out money and bury it in the backyard — or get a boat and sail away.

Update: listening to the hearings this morning, it appears that the congress may have learned some of the lessons from the Swedish crisis of 1992.

Of course, the Swedes weren’t in the middle of a hotly contested election campaign that featured a self-described maverick who sees his best route to victory as passage of a plan so he can run against it. That complicates matters immensely.

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